Uninstalling Vista / Reinstalling XP Problem...

I used a program called " Fix It Utilities 6 " to format the hard drive so i could put in XP so my wife can use my computer in her on line classes sense they are not compatible with VISTA yet. After using the " Fix It Utilities 6 " After Taking out vista, i tried to put in the XP. When it gets to the XP set up part, i get back that "' setup didn't find any hard disk drives on your computer-make sure any hard drive is powered on and properly connected to your computer "". Also when you get to the part where you reboot from the disk, it also says "" Missing OS or unformatted active partisan"" What could be up? This a Gateway laptop, and is less then a year old. I need to get my computer fixed because she is also having trouble with hers. If she misses to many days in on line classes, she could be dropped. Thanks in advance for any help..... KC9LKW@YAHOO.COM

 

First off, you don't anything to format the hard disk for Windows installs. Just boot up Windows disk & it will ask you where to install. The Fix-It might have screwed up the hard disk to the point of unrecognizable. Go to your hard disk manufacturer's site & download their free software to prepare the hard disk.

 

Newer laptops use SATA hard drive almost exclusively. Windows XP does not have native (built-in) SATA support and requires the installation of a driver during setup to recognize the SATA hard drive. The only way to install this driver is with a floppy drive, and since the laptop doesn't have one (I'm assuming it doesn't; I haven't seen a floppy in a laptop in a any new models for years) you can either use an external USB floppy drive -or- boot into and environment with SATA support (maybe your FixIT disc has it, or use the UBCD4Win, or maybe the utility from the hard drive manufacturer). Once your in an enviroment with SATA support, you can format the drive NTFS, then reboot to your XP install disc, and it should recognize the drive and allow you to install Windows. You can also remove the drive, use an adapter to plug it into a USB port on a functioning PC, and format it NTFS that way.
Good luck!

UBCD4Win http://www.majorgeeks.com/UBCD4Win_d5710.html
UBCD4Win how-to-build-the-CD guide http://www.ubcd4win.com/howto.htm